• Startseite
• Literatur
• Noten
• Noten 5-stimmig
• Praetorius, Michael: 7 Gavottes

Praetorius, Michael: 7 Gavottes

for 5 instruments.

This suite of seven gavottes is taken from Praetorius´ Terpischore of 1612, where it ends the long succession of different kinds of branles that constitutes no. 1 in the collection. Francisque Caroubel, a French violinist who visited Praetorius´ home town of Wolfenbüttel in 1610, is credited with the whole group; he contributed over seventy dances to Praetorius´ vast collection.
According to Thoinot Arbeau´s Orchésographie of 1589, the gavotte is a variant of the branle; according to him a it was common practice to dance a few gavottes at the end of a suite of branles. The steps are fairly simple, suggesting a tempo of around minim = 100. The tune given by Arbeau corresponds to no. 1, though the phrases appear in reverse order.
The original note values have been preserved. Editorial accidentals appear above the stave, applying to the one note only. Original accidentals are taken as applying to the whole bar. In the original, Gavotte 4 ends with two repeated minims, and Gavotte 5 begins with minim and crotchet rests. The slurs that appear over some repeated minims are probably indications of articulation rather than ties.
Consorts of strings (violin family, or a mixture of violins and viols), recorders, or cornetts, shawms and sackbuts can be used for these pieces. If performing the suite in its entirety, some variation of instrumentation is desirable: it is quite permissible, for instance, to perform one or more of the pieces on a solo instrument with percussion.
More substantial selections from Terpsichore can be found in vols 11-16 of our Early Dance Music series; Caroubel´s masterly passamezzos and galliards in five and six parts are in our TM69.